NH Skies Are Hazy From California Wildfires

When I saw the radar images of the smoke plume stretching up through Canada and then down into northern New England, I couldn't believe it.

Even though our skies will be hazy due to the California Wildfires, thankfully our air quality will remain unaffected.

The fact that the jet stream pulled the smoke up into Canada and then southeast to us made me think of something that happened in the Spring of 2010.

I remember leaving my apartment building at Linscott Court in Rochester and smelling this hideous acrid smoke. I thought someone had taken a plastic bag of rank wet trash and put in on the burning coals of a big fire pit.

I couldn't wait to get in my car and escape it.

After the nearly 2 and half mile commute to my folks house in Gonic, I was horrified to discover that I hadn't escaped the smoke at all.

Massive wildfires were ravaging Quebec at the time. Almost a quarter MILLION acres. And get this. The area was almost 2 hundred miles NORTHEAST of Montreal.

The air quality of nearly all New England was affected by those blazes, with poor breathing conditions reported as far away as Rhode Island.

I remember the weather reports claiming that the wind had shifted to the Northeast and even though it had only been about a day and a half, I was never so thankful to have fresh air as I did then

I cannot imagine trying to breathe while living anywhere near the source of this current 5,000 mile plume. We can only continue to hope for the best for our friends and family members of the West Coast.